This interview is the Cat’s Meow!
In this episode, I’ll chat with Tish Walshe, the founder of Cats Anonymous, will tell you everything you ever wanted to know about cat rescue. We’ll learn about all of the programs that the shelter offers – not just adoption, but also a Trap, Neuter, Return for feral cats, and a feral kitten program!
Find Cats Anonymous Rescue & Adoption here –
Web: https://www.catsanonymous.ca
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CatsAnonymousRescueandAdoption
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cats.anonymous.rescue/
Now, let’s get to the interview!
Transcription:
Laura Wombwell
Hi there, it’s Laura from Laura Wombwell Photography and joining me today is Tish Walshe, supervisor and founder of Cats Anonymous Rescue and Adoption. Hi Tish! I am so excited to have you here today. So I would love to hear a little bit about how Cats Anonymous got started.
Tish Walshe
Well, it basically snowballed. You know, I found a stray cat way back when and took him in and nurtured him. From there, I started rescuing stray cats and finding them homes because I already had seven at that point and thought I can’t keep keeping all these cats. And then I joined up with the vet community, I started working in a vet clinic and the word got out that I was rescuing cats. And I thought, okay, this is an area of need. I’m going to have to grow on this. So the shelter sort of slowly evolved. Over the years, I’ve been doing this for almost 30 years.
Laura Wombwell
Oh, wow. I know, you run a number of programs with Cats Anonymous. So what sort of cats do you serve?
Tish Walshe
Well, basically, we will help out any cats that are in need. The first program that we started with, and run here is the shelter, obviously, where we will take in people’s pets when they are no longer able to care for them. You know, whether it’s just a change in life situations, somebody is ill somebody is moving. Allergies, there’s all kinds of reasons that pets find themselves homeless, or they’re just not fitting in to the actual environment anymore due to circumstance changes, etc. So those cats will come into the shelter for adoption, we start them off in our new arrivals quarantine area to make sure they’re healthy, update them on anything that needs to be done. And then from there, we move them into whatever room in the shelter they fit into, you know, not all cats can live in a community setting. So we have our swinging singles room, we call it. And that’s where – you have to have a sense of humor in this world. And so that’s where the cats who do not play nicely with others live, they come out one at a time, they have the run of the room for the day and then they go back into their you know, three level enclosure. But they don’t come out together or they’re gonna fight or have behavior problems. And so some cats have to live in that room. They just they’re not tolerant of others of their homes. We also have our main adoption room, which is the community room, it’s for the cats that are okay with each other or love each other. And that room is our biggest area, it’s a really happy room to go into because all the cats are comfortable and happy. There’s a sofa, there’s all kinds of scratchers, there’s an outdoor enclosure. We also have our spa room, which is the special needs cats. And anybody who’s got special dietary needs or medical needs is in there. So they get a little bit more one on one and it’s a smaller room. We also have our kitten room, which is part of our kitten program. And that sort of encompasses the whole shelter. So once a cat is ready for adoption and goes into the room that’s appropriate for them. They can then stay with us as long as it takes to find the proper home for them. We like to ensure that we’ve got a good match, you know, and that way they’re going to be able to stay in the home forever. That’s our first program. Second program is our feral cat program. And that’s what they call TNR trap neuter return. I don’t know if you’re familiar with it.
Laura Wombwell
I’d love to hear more about it. Yeah.
Tish Walshe
Well trap neuter return is focusing on the street cats. And you know, street cats live everywhere in subdivisions, in people’s sheds, under their decks. They’re in local farms that you know, they just wander from barn to barn. Of course, the tomcats are looking for love, the girls are looking for somewhere to have a safe place to have their babies. So these are cats that are are feral. They have grown up without human contact. So they’re not socialized to people. So although they’re a domestic cat, they aren’t comfortable around us. And they don’t want to be in our homes. You know, they they avoid us at all costs.
If they get cornered, they get aggressive because they’re fearing for their lives. Basically, you know, it’s not like your cat Fluffy, who wants to sleep in your bed every night. These are cats that just want to be left alone outside, but they still need to be looked after. You know. So that program I think is very important because that’s where a lot of our population problems come from. So we have volunteers we go out into these industrial areas, neighborhoods, barns, and we live trap the cats humanely. Bring them to the spay neuter clinic. So they are then stopping the population explosion. And then they’re returned to their colony. So we make sure that whoever has been looking after them is on board for continuing to look after them for the rest of their lives, offering shelter in their barn or shed or wherever they have been living, and then making sure that they do get fed every day and fresh water. If there’s any problems in the future, you know, somebody gets injured or sick, we will come back we will live trap, we will have them looked at again. You know, these are cats that don’t belong to anybody, but somebody is kind enough to let them live in their backyard and kind enough to feed them out of the goodness of their heart. And, you know, the interesting thing with these ferals is that, although these people never touch them, they get such a relationship with them. You know, they love them from afar. And they name them, but they can’t even put their hands on them and cuddle them. But we still develop a relationship. It’s quite beautiful, really, you know, because the feral cats aren’t really giving anything back like your house cat or your dog does. But they are in some way, you know, these people feel the need to care for them. And I think that’s lovely.
Laura Wombwell
I think so too.
Tish Walshe
And you know, we’d rather they all came inside and slept on beds and were warm and safe and didn’t have to worry about maybe being hit by a car or chased by a coyote. Nobody likes to think about that. But unfortunately, that is their lifestyle, and they’re not going to adjust to being in a being in a home. So this is the best we can do. Let’s get them healthy. Let’s get them spayed, neutered, vaccinated. And then we go back twice a year with the deworming program with everyone to keep them parasite free. So it’s a good program, and it’s the best we can do for them with what we’ve got and with their situation.
Laura Wombwell
Perfect. What is your very favorite thing about doing this, this kind of work? What what fills your heart with joy about Cat Rescue?
Tish Walshe
Gosh, there’s so many things, you know, really obviously, the most obvious thing is seeing a cat blossom from illness or sadness or whatever, and going off to a new loving home where they’re going to be cherished again. And that obviously is a very big part of it. For me, I think you probably could tell by the way it was talking about the feral cats. That’s my passion. And you know, these cats are unloved, they’re downtrodden, the tomcats are so beaten up because they’re fighting each other for territory and for breeding rights on all the females. And they’re, they’re these old warriors that come in scarred and fearsome. And, you know, we clean them up. After a couple of months or even a few years has passed these warriors, they have blossomed and become comfortable around people, not to the point that they want to come in and sleep on your bed, become comfortable with their humans, the ones that they trust that feed them and don’t, you know, push their boundaries. And they’re not beat up anymore. They’re clean, they’re healthy, they’re fat and sassy.
It’s great to see them surviving much, much better, you know, so I really love that program. And of course, the third program that comes out of our feral cat program is our kitten adoption program. Our kittens all literally come off the streets. We don’t take in kittens from. Perhaps Mrs. Smith didn’t get Fluffy spayed in time and she had kittens oops. Well, those kittens are looked after Mrs. Smith isn’t going to throw them out on the road, she’s going to make sure they find a home. So those guys don’t really need us. But these guys from the feral colonies that are literally living on the streets, they need us. So that’s where all our kittens come from. Believe it or not, we probably take in 75 to 100 kittens every year.
Yeah. That’s from our feral TNR program. You know, so if you imagine if we weren’t doing that spay neuter program, how many kittens would be born? Year after year after year? Right? So, you know, making sure that these kittens get off the street and then they have a better life. It all sort of connects, you know.
Laura Wombwell
So, when a cat comes into one of your programs, not so much the the TNR program, but your adoption program or your kitten program, what’s their journey from there? Are they there at the shelter? Are they in foster care? How do they find that that loving home?
Tish Walshe
So again, two sort of different programs, the kittens that we take in usually they need a little bit of TLC. Cuz they’re not 100% healthy. And also a lot of them are semi feral already. They’re hissing spitting little demons and they’ll fight you. And they have the sharpest little teeth you wouldn’t believe. So these guys need a lot of hands on. Being in a shelter situation for them isn’t good for many reasons, they need more socializing one on one with people than they’re going to get in a cage situation. You can’t just sort of leave them leave them loose in a room where there’s going to run in the corner and hide so you need to be able to get to them without chasing them and scaring them. Monster after me you know. And, and of course, it is so so those guys we put into foster homes. We’ve got an army of wonderful volunteers who love kitten season. Love getting in their little babies too, so that they can nurture them. And to watch those little guys blossom from these hissing spitting little balls of fluff to someone who’s curled up in your lap and purring, happily, and then going off to a home is wonderful. So they’ll start off in the foster home for quite a few weeks after they’ve been vetted. And then they’ll come back to the shelter and be in our kitten room, where they then are seen by people for adoption.
Laura Wombwell
Perfect. What do you wish that the general public knew about rescue work?
Tish Walshe
I guess one of the things that that people should realize is that rescue work is exhausting. You know, you might think, gosh, I’d like to work in rescue. And I’d like to do that as a job. It isn’t a job.
It becomes your life. It engulfs everything that you do. You know, when people ask me, What do I do for fun? I think I don’t really get a lot of time, I work too much. You know, and yeah, rescue work doesn’t, it isn’t what you do, it’s who you are. So it is very, very emotionally exhausting, as well as physically exhausting. And you know, a lot of the times people will email and they’ll say, geez, I sent you an email, I left a message. Nobody’s called me back. It’s been a week. And, and you know, I think be patient with us. You know, most people in rescue are volunteers. They have families, they have jobs. They’re trying to make a living, as well as give as much of themselves to the cats as they can. So I think what I’d like people to be is kind and patient to rescue workers. We don’t mean to not call them back, we want to call them back. But if we’ve got 20 kittens that need to be fed and bathed and cleaned, and it’s 11 o’clock at night, by the time we’re finished, we’re done. You know, so the cat care is always going to come first. And then the people communications are always going to be left to last and then you just run out of time. Sometimes too it’s a matter of I can’t say no one more time, you know, because we are in this business, because we want to help animals, you know, that’s what we want to do. But there are so many out there in need. That sometimes we have to say no. And to us that’s crushing. You know, we don’t want to say no, we want to say yes, bring them all. But we have physical limitations. We only have so much room in the shelter. We only have so many foster rooms, we only have so many funds, you know, so so sometimes we might not call someone back because we can’t bear to say no one more time. You know, we really want to say yes, but we can’t always.
Laura Wombwell
Speaking of things that the community can do to help support you. I know that you have some ongoing fundraising events. I know COVID has changed everything for a lot of organizations. But if folks want to help you out with fundraising, what do you have going on right now?
Tish Walshe
One of the things that I think all charities are finding hardest fundraising because we’ve had to change our ways and go to cyber fundraising rather than group fundraising. You know, we used to have open houses here at the shelter where people could come we would sell crafts made by our volunteers, we would have chili dinners. And our biggest fundraiser, which supports our kitten program was our silent auction and luncheon. And that was always fun because we’d be 100 people getting together. Cat lovers telling stories, having lunch, silent auction, lots of laughs, lots of camaraderie. So it’s sad not to have that from our point of view of the getting together and we’re getting used to that with COVID. But also that impacts your fundraising that was $10,000 out of our fundraising budget that went directly to our kitten fund. You know, our our kitten program probably costs us between $20,000 and $25,000 a year. By the time we buy all the proper food, proper vet medications and I’m spays and neuters microchips vaccines, etc, of getting these little guys healthy. And you know, adoption fees cover part of that. But they don’t cover all of it. So that’s where our fundraising efforts come in. And that’s where the silent auction was very helpful. So currently, we’re doing a cyber fundraiser online. And it’s through Canadahelps. I don’t know if you’ve heard of them. But they are a government run organization online, so people can safely donate funds through through the internet. And we don’t have to set up the secure connection. So it helps us save some money. And so if they go to our website, catsanonymous.ca, or follow our Facebook page, there’ll be a connection to our website and to canadahelps, where you can donate to the kitten fundraising program. And you can donate whatever you can, you know, $10 $20 or more, if you’re able, it’s it’s very heartwarming to see how many people are donating in these hard times. You know, it’s amazing, because we know everybody is financially as well as emotionally strained, and yet they’re still opening their hearts, you know. So that’s online. And we’re working on because we had a lot of stuff donated to our silent auction last year, and we couldn’t. Nobody wants to let these great items go to waste. You know, they’re sitting here in our storage shed. So we are organizing and figuring out how to do an online silent auction. And so right now we’re cataloguing, taking pictures and figuring out how to put it onto a website so that people can do our silent auction cyber.
Laura Wombwell
Perfect. Now, if folks don’t have the funds to donate right now, are there other ways that they could help?
Tish Walshe
Absolutely, you know, one thing that people can always do is, is volunteering in one way or another, clearly, again, COVID, we can’t be having new volunteers come into the shelter, we’re working on our core volunteers here. So because we are mainly volunteer run, so our main volunteers are still coming in to look after the cats. But there’s still a lot of other things that can be done, you know, fundraising, people can have their own little fundraisers online, you know, that kind of thing. Get creative. People who can make things, they can make toys for cats, they can make blankets, they can make things that could be sold, you know, and then the money donated. And, you know, some people have talents as well, that they could perhaps do something here at the shelter. You know, a fellow came forward the other day and said, You know, my wife volunteers there and I’m, I’m an electrician, you know, is there something that you might need fixed? If you can’t donate funds, you can donate your talents.
Laura Wombwell
That’s wonderful and, and I think not everyone would think like, Oh, I’m handy, maybe I can, you know, contribute in that way. So giving folks ways to donate their time is amazing.
Tish Walshe
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And let’s face it, a lot of people are looking for things to do. Because we can’t get out and about one of our one of our volunteers knits catnip mice, that the cats in the shelter love to play with, and we give them out with adoptions, the adopters love getting them, the kittens love playing with them. And she’s busy knitting away and it’s, you know, keeps her feeling like she’s giving back.
Laura Wombwell
So, I’d love to learn a little bit about you, and your pets. So who lives with you currently?
Tish Walshe
Currently, we have four cats and one dog, there is one token dog in this whole crazy cat world. He’s a very tolerant dog. He loves cats. He’s very polite with them. He knows not pushes boundaries. And he actually gets to come into the shelter and do the dog tests, so to speak. We want to make sure that with adult cats, especially if they’re going to go to a home with a dog, that they’re going to be comfortable. You know, there’s some cats that love dogs, some cats that are like, well, I’ll tolerate you as long as you stay over there and others who are like No way, keep that being away from me. So we want to make sure we send the right ads to dark homes. So Pinti, our little dog is actually the honorary shelter dog, and he comes in and does dog time in the shelter to see who’s comfortable and who isn’t. And so he’s he’s our dog in the house. The four cats we have are all seniors, and generally the only cats that make it into our house are seniors with medical issues. They’ve been in the shelter, they’re not as likely to get adopted. So they make their way next door into our place. And we just have a pension for these oldies and have the experience to help them keep going medically and support them, you know, that kind of thing. So we have Edgar Allen, who is a Siamese. And we also have Lady Gaga. We just call her The Lady. A lot of the names are given to them when they’re here in the shelter.
Lady Gaga was a stray who was found on the streets in Arthur with no ears, they were gone by frostbite, and the most rotten mouth you’d ever see. She needed to have all her teeth out. Our third cat is Bruce. He’s our oldest. He’s 18. And Bruce has been with us about probably nine years now. And has some, of course, you know, ongoing age health related issues. Although he’s in great shape, he does have a very mild start of an intestinal cancer. But he’s on meds and he’s doing really well. He still runs, plays kicks around his catnip mouse. And then our last cat is Figo. We actually call him Pudding, because it’s a much softer name. And Figo was actually the first cat to ever get kicked out of the shelter. He was very aggressive in the shelter, and the volunteers were afraid of him after many biting incidents, and they were frightening biting incidents. Everyone said, Look, we can’t look after this cat. We’re afraid of him. And we thought fair enough. So we did manage to gentle him up by taking him into a stable environment. A lot of cats that are a bit reactive, don’t do well, in a shelter environment, because there’s different people every day, there’s a lot of noise, commotion, a lot of different cats coming and going. And so he was always annoyed in the shelter and the smallest thing would set him off and he just explode. So he’s been in the house with us now, I want to say at least four years, I lose track of time, and in the beginning had a few episodes. But we learned to be quieter. We’ve learned to walk slowly and not run and carry on. And we’re not reckless, he’s really settled down. He sleeps every night on Jodie’s chest, he absolutely adores her. And the people in the shelter can’t believe that this killer cat now sleeps on someone’s chest and isn’t going for the jugular. Yeah. Oh, that’s our menagerie in the house.
Laura Wombwell
And do you have any favorite things that you like to do with the cats? And the dog?
Tish Walshe
Yeah, I was gonna say that the dog mostly is happy just to be with me. He would love to go for walks more often. But he takes them when he can get them. He’s very patient. You know, with the cats. They’re older. So they’re pretty calm. They’re not being players anymore. They’re not running and carrying on. So we do a lot of reading time together. You know, just nice to quietly sit read a book or watch a movie with a kittie curled up on your lap.
Laura Wombwell
So before we finish, I have some rapid fire questions for you.
Tish Walshe
Okay, I’m ready for your rapid fire questions.
Laura Wombwell
Perfect. Okay, cat or dog?
Tish Walshe
Cat.
Laura Wombwell
Favorite breed?
Tish Walshe
Siamese.
Laura Wombwell
What are your pets favorite treats?
Tish Walshe
Hands down Temptations.
Laura Wombwell
Are your pets full of beings full of dreams are full of something entirely different?
Tish Walshe
I think each one of them is full of something entirely different.
Laura Wombwell
If your pets were in a band together, what kind of music would they play?
Tish Walshe
Well, that’s a good question. They probably all couldn’t agree on what they would want to play. They are all very individual personalities who don’t really love each other and snuggled up together. So there probably be a lot of jostling and they would probably play a wide variety of things just to placate each other.
Laura Wombwell
Love that answer. Finally, if money were no object, what’s one incredible thing that you would do to spoil your pets?
Tish Walshe
Oh, that’s a that’s a good question. I would build a beautiful outdoor enclosure for them that had natural trees growing up. through it so they can climb. They could get a lot of sunshine and they could real cats outdoors but safe. Outdoor oasis.
Laura Wombwell
Nice. So before we finish off, I would love to know, what can the southwestern Ontario pet community do to best support you and Cats Anonymous.
Tish Walshe
Um, I think, you know, basically spreading the word about the good work that we do here. You know, if people can easily follow us on Facebook, there’s a lot of happy stories there. The happy endings, you know, just the work that we’re doing here, cartoons. And if they spread the stories far and wide, the more that people know about us, the more followers will have and the more donations we can probably garner during these tough times to keep us going in the future as well. So I think really, let’s just all band together and support each other.
Laura Wombwell
Amazing. Well, thank you so much for sharing some of your time today. Tish. I really appreciate it. Is there anything else that you would like to say to the folks listening?
Tish Walshe
I would just like to say thanks for listening to us. Thanks to you for doing this. Again, in these times. It’s nice to have as much input with people as possible. And you know, try and stay positive, everybody try and be supportive and be kind.
Laura Wombwell
Awesome. Well, thanks again. This is Laura from Laura Wombwell Photography. I’m joined by Tish Walshe of Cats Anonymous Rescue and Adoption and we both hope that you and your pets have an awesome day. Bye!
Tish Walshe
Bye!
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